Trump And Doj Ask Supreme Court To Toss $83 Million Defamation Verdict In E. Jean Carroll Case

WASHINGTON — President Trump and nan Justice Department are asking nan Supreme Court to flip an $83 cardinal defamation verdict won by writer E. Jean Carroll aft she accused him of intersexual assault, saying he can’t beryllium sued for comments he made while he was president.

It’s nan 2nd clip Trump has asked nan justices to nix damages awarded by a assemblage to Carroll, a longtime proposal columnist and erstwhile TV talk show host. The Supreme Court refused successful June to perceive his entreaty of different verdict, for $5 million, that recovered him liable for intersexual maltreatment and defamation.

The latest lawsuit centers connected comments Trump made during his first word arsenic president. The Justice Department wants to invoke nan Westfall Act, which shields authorities labor from being sued for doing their jobs.

“Absent this Court’s intervention, nan sitting President is facing astir a 100 cardinal dollars of individual liability for behaviour that was good wrong nan scope of his national office,” national attorneys wrote. “That unsocial deserves this Court’s attention.”

The entreaty was revenge electronically and is expected to beryllium formally docketed pinch nan tribunal Wednesday.

Trump’s lawyers, meanwhile, based on that an appeals tribunal “engaged successful procedural contortions” to debar addressing Trump’s claims that statesmanlike immunity protects him from nan $83 cardinal grant because he made nan statements successful mobility successful 2019 while he was president.

The lawyers based on that nan 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals successful Manhattan ruled successful a mode that “cries retired for this Court’s reappraisal successful this unprecedented case” and called nan damages “grossly excessive.”

“This is nan first lawsuit successful our nation’s history successful which a tribunal has imposed damages liability connected a president for his behaviour successful office,” nan lawyers wrote.

Carroll’s lawyers person declined to remark connected nan latest Trump filing.

Trump has agelong based on he cannot beryllium sued complete comments he made astir Carroll during his first word wherever he disavowed knowing her and attacked her motivations for going nationalist pinch her communicative successful a caller memoir. He’s besides asking nan Supreme Court justices to reconsider their rejection of his entreaty successful nan $5 cardinal verdict.

The entreaty comes astir 2 years aft nan Supreme Court granted Trump wide immunity from criminal prosecution arsenic a erstwhile president.

Carroll testified doubly earlier New York juries that Trump sexually assaulted her successful outpouring 1996 successful a dressing room astatine Bergdorf Goodman, a luxury retailer crossed nan thoroughfare from Trump Tower. She first went nationalist pinch nan claims successful a 2019 memoir.

She sued Trump for defamation aft he accused her of making up nan allegation to thief book sales, adding that he’d ne'er met her and “she’s not my type.” He has many times denied immoderate wrongdoing.

A Manhattan assemblage awarded her $83 cardinal successful damages successful January 2024. Lower courts person truthful acold rejected Trump’s appeals to overturn nan verdict, though nan New York-based appeals tribunal divided complete nan determination and agreed to hold that payout until nan Supreme Court weighs in.

In 2023, different assemblage said Carroll was entitled to $5 cardinal aft concluding that Trump had subjected her to intersexual maltreatment successful nan section shop brushwood and for defamation for remarks he had made aft his first word ended. That judgement has been paid.

The Associated Press does not place group who opportunity they person been sexually assaulted unless they travel guardant publicly, arsenic Carroll has done.

Whitehurst and Neumeister constitute for nan Associated Press. Neumeister reported from New York.